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Chapter 2
Carlos didn't move when the paramedics came alongside him and knelt down next to Kate.
"You need to move," one of them said. "We need to work here."
He didn't move. He couldn't leave Kate's side. Not when she had been shot saving him and his partner.
"Out of the way so we can do our job," the second medic said, his tone harsher.
Officer Janko was there then, tugging at his arm, pulling him away from Kate.
He gave Kate a last look then looked for Joe. The medics were wrapping a dressing around his torso. He tried to go to him, but Janko stopped him.
"You're the one who called this in?" she asked.
Carlos watched them start to lift Joe onto a stretcher. "I need to go with my partner," he said. He followed behind the medics, but Janko fell into step with him.
"I need to notify your superiors."
Carlos just needed to get out of there. He needed to get in the ambulance with his partner. "My dad," he said. "Just call my dad. Sargaent Renzulli out of the 12th."
The blast of fresh air outside the bar hit him, slowing some of his frantic thoughts.
"Renzulli?" Janko repeated. "You're Renzulli's kid?"
Carlos paused long enough to see if that was going to be a problem.
"I'll let him know," the lady cop said. "You go make sure your partner is ok."
Carlos nodded his thanks and climbed into the ambulance behind the medic. Janko shut the doors for them and gave a knock to signal to the driver to take off.
The medic hooked Joe up to the monitors and jotted down the readings without speaking.
Carlos blew out a long breath. He looked at Joe's still face. He thought of the girl back at the bar, not moving either.
He dropped his head into his hands and willed the ambulance to drive faster.
#
Eddie nodded to the medics as they loaded the girl. The man's body still lay on the floor, pronounced dead and waiting for the medical examiner. Crime scene techs were starting to show up.
"Any idea who the girl is yet?" Witten asked her partner.
Eddie lifted the backpack she had found behind the bar. "Maybe." She opened it and rifled through. No ID. She zipped the pocket closed and tried another zipper. Nothing useful there. She was about to close it when she noticed a bulge in the lining inside the bag.
She carefully ripped the seam open and a handful of cards spilled out.
"What?" she murmured to herself, shuffling through the small stack of aged business cards.
There were four courtesy cards for the NYPD. Eddie flipped them over to read the names. Danny Reagan, Jaime Reagan, Frank Reagan, and one, clearly older than the rest, for Joe Reagan. The last card was a business card for the DA's office, naming Erin Reagan-Boyle as an assistant DA.
Eddie looked over to where the medics had the girl stabilized enough to move and were wheeling her out the door. She dropped the cards back into the backpack and followed after them. "I'm going to ride with Jane Doe to the hospital," she called across the bar to her partner.
She took a seat in the back of the ambulance, looking at the pale girl, the blood soaking through her bandages. The dark hair, the vaguely familiar jawline. She pulled her phone out of her pocket. Overhead a siren blared to life.
"Jaime," she said when her husband answered. "You need to get to St. Victor's. Now."
#
Joe heard a lot of noise. A lot of muffled commotion. He forced open eyes that didn't want to cooperate.
He hurt. His entire stomach burned, ached, and…He grunted. Every time he moved it pulled painfully.
The noise brought someone to his side.
"Getting stabbed was a stupid move."
Joe felt his lips lift in a small smile. "Wouldn't have happened if my partner was faster," he tried for a joke.
But Carlos's dark eyes were serious. "I'm sorry."
Joe shook his head. "Wasn't your fault," he said. He started to sit up weakly, but hands were there pushing him down.
"Doctor says you need to stay put. You lost blood and they're giving you a transfusion."
Joe looked over at the bag of red hanging alongside his bed.
"The girl?" he asked, as the fog started to dissipate from his mind. "Kate? How is she?"
Carlos shook his head. "They said she's critical. She's in surgery."
"Damn."
The curtain to his tiny area of the ER opened and Sargaent Renzulli came in. Joe caught the flash of uniforms filling the already busy ER space behind him.
Renzulli looked his son over, worry taking over his features at the sight of Joe and Kate's blood staining the front of Carlos' shirt.
"I'm fine," Carlos assured his dad.
Renzulli's breath released in a rush and his shoulders dropped. He clapped a hand to his son's shoulder and nodded. He visibly fought back emotion before pulling Carlos to him in a tight hug.
"When Janko called…" he started.
"I know," Carlos said. "But I'm fine. Joe's going to be fine. We're fine."
Renzulli nodded and released his son. He looked to Joe.
"We're both fine," Joe repeated Carlos' assurance.
Renzulli looked between the two of them. "If you two…" He visibly fought for control and pressed his lips together. Moisture built in his eyes and he blinked it back. "If you two ever make me get a call like that again, I'll kill you myself."
Carlos wrapped an arm around his dad, then winced at the movement.
Joe didn't miss the pain that flashed across Carlos' face, and neither did Renzulli. He gripped his son's arm and looked. Some of the blood wasn't Joe's.
"You got a pretty good knife cut there yourself."
"It's nothing," Carlos said, trying to pull away.
"It needs stitches," his dad countered.
"It's—" Before Carlos could argue further, Renzulli had pulled back the curtain and called for a doctor.
A lady cop in uniform and a sargaent with her were in deep conversation, but they turned at his voice. Joe felt his breath stick in his throat when he saw the sargaent.
The sargaent said something to the lady and went to give Renzulli a hard squeeze to his shoulder. Joe watched the two exchange a look that told of a long history and a strong bond. He licked lips that were suddenly dry and willed himself to not draw attention to himself. The sargaent looked just like the picture Joe had looked up online.
"Thanks for coming down," Renzulli said.
The other sargaent nodded and gave Carlos a clap on the back. "I'm glad you made it out of that," he said. He looked over at the bed and Joe was sure he recognized this sargaent. This was him.
"Sounds like you got lucky," the sargaent said to him.
Joe let out a breath and tried to force a wry laugh. "Yeah. Something like that."
"I'm Sargaent Reagan," the man introduced himself. "I go way back with your partner's old man."
Joe had thought it was him. But hearing him say the name out loud gave him the proof that made him put up his guard. Reagan. This man was his dad's brother. His uncle.
"Joe Hill," he said, his hands gripping the sheets as he looked for any hint of recognition in Jaime's face. He wasn't sure if he was relieved or disappointed when there wasn't any.
Of course there wasn't any. None of the Reagans knew about him. And he had only known about them, about his link to them, for three months.
Jaime gave him a handshake. "I'm really glad you're alright," he said sincerely. "Your own sargaent will be in to see you soon. I have some things I have to take care of."
A warm handshake for Carlos and Renzulli, and he was gone. Joe swallowed hard. The man didn't know he was family. He couldn't blame him for walking away. But it still stung. A whole family who was in blue and looked out for one another, and he wasn't part of the circle.
He dropped his head back against his pillows, fighting for each breath. He didn't want to be part of the circle. That's what he had decided when his mom first told him who his dad really was three months ago. He didn't want the baggage that came with being a cop named Reagan. But shaking hands with an uncle who didn't even know who he was? He hadn't prepared himself for that.
He barely noticed when Carlos left, a doctor bringing him to another room to look at his arm, and Joe was alone.
He had just had his first introduction to his father's side of the family. And no one in that family had any idea he existed.
#
Jaime glanced behind him at the curtained off room where Joe Hill lay back against his pillows again. The younger man was familiar. He couldn't shake the feeling he had met him before, that he was supposed to recognize him.
"Is Carlos ok?" Eddie asked.
Jaime gave the man one last look and turned his attention back to his wife. "He and his partner are both going to be fine." He looked around the packed ER, filling up with cops coming to make sure that two of their own were going to be ok.
"Thanks for calling me down here for Renzulli. I can't imagine how he felt getting a call that his son was headed here." He searched the bustling ER to see where Renzulli and Carlos had been taken.
"Jaime," Eddie said. He kept looking for his old partner. "Jaime," she said again, more forcefully. "That's not why I called you."
He finally looked at his wife. Her mouth was pulled in a tight line. She looked at the crowd around him and moved toward a quieter corner.
"What?" he asked.
"The girl who's in surgery," she started.
Jaime raised his eybrows when she didn't continue. "What about her? Is something wrong?"
Eddie shook her head. She pressed her lips together and then burst out. "Jaime, I think she's your sister."
Her words were so far from anything he expected, they didn't make sense at first. He stared at her.
"I think she might be Katie."
The words sunk in. "Did she say something?" His heart started to pound. It had been at least a year since any of them had even the slightest lead to follow. A hollow feeling gnawed in his stomach as he remembered what every single lead always led to. A dead end. The wrong girl. Not Katie.
"She had these," Eddie said. She went to the nurse's station and came back with a faded black backpack and unzipped it, handing him a handful of courtesy cards.
Jaime flipped through the cards, stopping at Joe's. The pain of losing Joe twisted with the loss of his little sister and the sudden flare of hope that she may be near.
"I need to see her," he said suddenly.
"Jaime, we don't know for sure it's her. I've never met her, she was gone before I met you. I could be wrong."
Jaime knew she was right. The young woman in the bar, and now in surgery, might not be the younger sister who had taken off four years ago.
"Why would she have our cards? And only our cards?" It had to be her. It had to be his baby sister, Katie. "She has Joe's card," he said quietly.
"I know."
Jaime saw a surgeon step into the crowded waiting room that edged the ER and look around until he spotted Eddie. He crossed to her and Jaime.
"Your Jane Doe is out of surgery. She's waking up."
Jaime took a bracing breath. He felt Eddie take his hand.
This had to be Kate. It had to be his little sister.
#
